Wednesday, June 04, 2014

Word of the Day -- Anthropization

Anthropization is the conversion of open spaces, landscapes, and natural environments by human action.

Anthropic erosion is the process of human action degrading terrain and soil.

An area may be classified as anthropized even though it looks natural, such as grasslands that have been deforested by humans. It can be difficult to determine how much a site has been anthropized in the case of urbanization because one must be able to estimate the state of the landscape before significant human action.

An example of advanced anthropization: the cultivation of rice in terraces in Vietnam